


Into the Great Wide Open

by LottaCharlene



Category: The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - After Saviors, Developing Relationship, Friendship, From fighting zombies to fighting orcs, Gen, M/M, Modern Character in Middle Earth, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV First Person, chosen family, other characters to be added - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:40:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29757681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LottaCharlene/pseuds/LottaCharlene
Summary: Fiona hasn't survived a post-apocalyptic war to watch her two best friends snap at each other like cats fighting over fishbones, so she decides to interfere. Only the trip doesn't go as planned: Daryl and Paul are still ticking each other off, when they realize that they somehow left the woods surrounding Hilltop and find themselves suddenly somewhere else entirely with no idea and no way to get back. There don't seem to be walkers there, but those dark, screeching creatures are not very soothing either ...
Relationships: Daryl Dixon/Jesus
Comments: 9
Kudos: 9





	1. The big nothing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Melethril](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melethril/gifts).



> As a teen I was fascinated by Peter Jackson's movies of The Lord of the Ring and I still have a soft spot for the typical "modern girl gets sucked into Middle Earth and now has to play her part" stories and fics. There are a few very good ones out there, but mainly they have all the same "problem": the girl usually has no idea how to fight or how to survive in the wild. Since I am a huge The Walking Dead fan as well, I thought - why not combine the two? So this is my take on that trope, with a girl, who has survived the end of the modern world, has picked up fighting skills along the way and knows how to start a fire without matches (although it still is easier if you have some). 
> 
> I tried my hand at three things with this story: first, it's the first long story I have written in first person. I know, not everyone likes that style, but I hope I can win you over ;-) Second, this includes an original female character as the main character. I have never published anything with an OC before (or one that plays such a large role), so I hope you like her. Third, this story will contain the development of a romantic relationship, but not (or at least for now) the main character, but the one of Daryl and Paul, so I'll have to try getting these two together without any insights or thoughts to help me along the way. Yay!
> 
> Oh, and fair warning: I have already written quite a lot, but updates might still take a while, because - honestly? It got out of hand. This is going to be a monster, I fear.
> 
> So, whoever is going to read this, I hope you enjoy. I'd love some comments to know your thoughts.
> 
> Thanks to the amazing Melethril for thoughts about Paul and Daryl, tips and ideas, and for being there to nerd around with! :-) Since I now finally posted the first chapter, I might come around to bother you with more LotR stuff!

„You really are going to keep that, aren’t you?” Paul scrunched up his nose.

“Yeah, why the hell not? Least the trip was worth somethin’.”

“You call a dead snake ‘worth something’ now? Wow.”

Daryl threw Paul a sideways glance. “Ya don’t? Wanna tell me this all has been a waste of yer precious time, then?”

I tried very hard not to roll my eyes at their nagging. Great, really great. This was what I had in mind when I suggested us three getting out of Hilltop for a moment and checking out that old farmhouse. 

Paul was right, at least to the point that we hadn’t found anything back at the old farmhouse, besides from rotting furniture and broken dishware, that was. 

But I could see Daryl’s point as well. At least we had _something_ to show off, even if it wasn’t much. But apparently Paul saw it differently, since he had frowned as Daryl vanished off into the woods and came back with that snake hanging limp from his belt like a particularly thick rope.

I just wanted to have us back, the three of us together as we had been since before the war was over. It had been nice, my own little family, my safe place in all this chaos and death. But the war had changed so much for so many people. Why should I have been spared?

Daryl had vanished from the communities, instead settling somewhere in the forests surrounding us, showing up occasionally to keep in touch, deliver some game and help out if needed, but he didn’t stay anymore. Not since the incident with the collapsing wall anyway. Since Paul had to free some of Daryl’s torturers to ensure that the wall of tree trunks surrounding Hilltop, soaked after the heavy rainfall and more than wobbly in the muddy ground, wouldn’t fall and crash trailers, the forge and Hilltoppers. He didn’t really have a choice. The war had decimated our population and most were bound on other tasks as the wall had begun to lean dangerously inwards. The imprisoned Saviors had been free resources, so to speak.

Still, as Daryl had returned from his five-days-long hunting trip, sodding wet from the rain and with no game to show, he had been faced with people he had been barely tolerating, but ignoring, inside their little cage. Now they stood around without any restrains, mud on their faces, with Paul in their middle, giving instructions.

Daryl had turned on his heel and left again.

It had taken me almost two weeks to ‘track’ him down (my tracking skills were moderate at best and I stumbled over Daryl more than finding _evidence_ on the forest floor). He had set up camp somewhere in the forest, somewhat happy to see me, but he wasn’t moved to come back with me. It took some serious needling from my side so that he would finally spit it out for me. 

He had been off to Alexandria after seeing those ‘assholes runnin’ around in the sunshine’. When the gates had opened there, Negan had been standing in the middle of the new tomato field, calling out to him jovially. Turned out that Rick had allowed him out of his cell every now and then for supervised community work. 

Daryl had practically spat the words out as if they burned on his tongue like acid. The other communities had opened their doors for surviving Saviors as well, so the Kingdom and Oceanside were off Daryl’s map as well. He wouldn’t call somewhere home, when the people that had treated him worse than an animal were allowed to be people.

It was his way of coping with everything. 

And Paul. Well, Paul had buried himself into so much work that I sometimes wondered if he slept at all. He was the first person walking the grounds of Hilltop and the last seen pouring over maps and books in his office. Ever since Maggie had stepped down to care for little Hershel, I seldom saw Paul anymore. It seemed like he had decided that every life and every person’s well-being was his personal responsibility and far more important than his own health. 

I was worried, really worried about him, because Paul looked so pale sometimes. I couldn’t remember the last time we shared a meal and talked, really talked, about nothing and everything. I barely saw him sit down and eat these days, always placating me with a smile and then he was called over by someone and he was off.

I couldn’t remember the last time I saw Paul laugh either. 

I missed him. Missed them both, these idiots. 

And I thought the little scouting mission would help with that. Being back outside, away from everything, just us three.

Apparently not. Annie and Derek didn’t quarrel like these two and they were four and five years old.

“Hey, if Daryl catches even more snakes, you could at least have some snakeskin gloves made for you!” I called out to Paul in a poor attempt to lighten the mood. 

Paul looked unimpressed.

“Woman has some sense at least.” Daryl burrowed right in the opening I made. “’sides, the meat is fuckin’ delicious.” He grabbed the snake from his belt and waved it right under Paul’s nose, who demonstratively took two steps back.

“Stop that.” He glared at Daryl and then at me again, but the corners of his mouth twitched ever so slightly. 

A grin spread over my face without my permission. God, finally! 

“Shouldn’t we be back by now?” Paul tried to change the subject before I could say something. Daryl decided to have some mercy with him and put the snake back on his belt.

Instead of answering him, Daryl turned around to me. “Ya kept track?”

I scratched my neck. Daryl had been teaching me how to track and orientate myself out in the open, but I was far from confident. It still took me a long time staring at the night sky to locate the cardinal points (it was easier with the stars as a guidance and a real nightmare when clouds covered them). I was good as long as the sun was up of course, but even then I had to think too hard about in which direction to go to make it to a point I wanted to reach. It was a lot easier when I didn’t have to draw up a map from memory but could look at one.

“The direction is right and I think we have walked,” I squinted at the sun, “maybe half an hour? The road should be close.”

Daryl didn’t say anything and stared up at the sky himself.

“What?” I came to a stop next to him. “I measured like you showed me. I’m sure it hasn’t been more than one hour!” I couldn’t be that untalented. I squinted up again and quickly estimated the distance the sun was from the horizon with my fingers. No, almost four in the afternoon. The last time I measured, the sun was higher, but not by much.

Daryl slowly turned around himself.

Paul crossed his arms in front of his chest and raised one eyebrow. “Really? What is it with you today? What did you put in your coffee this morning? I wanna know, although I’m still not sure if I like Hilarious Daryl.”

“Had no coffee,” rasped Daryl absentmindedly. He touched the trunk of the nearest tree, an old oak.

An uneasiness spread slowly down my spine. Daryl was acting weird and it put my senses into overdrive. I strained my ears to hear something – anything – but apart from the birds in the trees there was nothing.

Paul picked up on our change immediately. His hands dropped to his knifes. 

“What is it?” he whispered.

I slowly turned around myself, eyes open and alert. Something nagged at the back of my mind that I was overseeing something obvious, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I grabbed the hilt of my long hunting knife.

“The trees have changed.” Daryl swung his crossbow from his back into his hands and slowly paced through the trees. We followed silently. Another thing Daryl taught us early on. By now, we knew how to move like hunters. 

“What?” Paul hissed. “Daryl, this isn’t funny.”

I eyed the trees around me. Daryl was right. The forest we had walked through from the road to the old farmhouse and back had been dense with slender and high trees, like birch trees, basswood, young maples and beeches with bushes of wild elderberries and blackberries. The leafy canopy had been bright and the sun had danced over the grassy patches beneath the trees.

The forest around us was so vastly different that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed right away. The trees were tall as well, but the light was dimmer. Old oaks, spruces and mighty beeches surrounded us, and the ground was no longer overgrown with grass and weeds. There were mossy patches, but mostly we walked on old needles, leaves and dirt. A few rocks peeked out from the earth.

I realized suddenly what had nagged me before. I still could hear birds singing, but the constant buzzing of the cicadas was gone. The mosquitos that had almost eaten me alive at night, were no longer flying around my head like a living, annoying halo.

“This looks like the forest of Hilltop to ya, Paul?” retorted Daryl. 

“But – how?” Paul turned around, staring back with furrowed brows the path we just had come. 

I copied his action, while Daryl scanned the way in front of us. I barely kept myself from rubbing my eyes. Never ever in our lives did we come this path. It was barely visible among the shadows of the trees, where it zigzagged down a slight rise. We had not taken that path.

“What the fuck is going on here,” muttered Paul. “Daryl?”

“The fuck do I know.”

“Where are we?” I dared to ask. My heart was picking up its pace and I could feel a drop of sweat running down between my shoulder blades. I drew my knife. Paul followed suit.

“Dunno.” Daryl’s quiet admittance was like a slap in my face. Daryl always knew where he was and how to get back.

I could feel how he pressed his back against my side, and Paul’s from my other. Back to back we stared with readied weapons between the trees, trying to see something familiar, or trying to see anything that gave some sort of explanation. I didn’t know what I expected, maybe a sign reading ‘Fair warning – you are now leaving reality!’ or something like that.

A line from a Stephen King novel, probably from the _Dark Tower_ -series, because I had read them one time too many, came unbitten to my mind. “Traveler, behold! Behind you lies Mid-World,” I muttered under my breath.

“Sh!” Daryl hissed and I snapped my mouth shut.

I didn’t know how long we stood there, trying to see, hear or even smell some hint. After a while, I felt Daryl slightly relaxing at my back.

“Let’s get movin’, we’re wastin’ light,” he said finally.

“Where to?” asked Paul eyeing warily a leaf that tumbled in the wind as if it had personally challenged him.

Daryl pointed with his crossbow to the path in front of us. “This way. It goes upwards so at least we might’ve get a look around.”

That sounded reasonable enough. Paul and I fell in step behind Daryl, who had lowered his crossbow slightly in favor of following the path, but not relaxed his trigger finger yet.

The path went on endlessly and never seemed to go anywhere. By now we should have reached the road back to Hilltop three times over and the sun was already sinking. The forest had remained the same strange but peaceful place like before, but it hadn’t changed back to our woods either. So far, we didn’t come across anything that would have helped us. No rusty old sign, no half overgrown car, no abandoned shed, nothing. Not even a walker. If I was honest that was the one thing that confused me the most. Nothing wrong with that, I was surely not looking forward to meeting one, but it was unusual to not even stumble upon one lone wanderer or a half rotten, snarling skeleton. 

Paul was a silent, tense shadow at my side. I knew he had promised to be back at Hilltop by nightfall and knowing him he rattled down a list in his mind what tasks were still unfulfilled and needed his immediate attention.

Guilt crawled up my throat at the thought that this was my fault. I had annoyed Paul with my begging, stealing him away from his crucial tasks at Hilltop for my own happiness. 

“Alright, we make camp,” Daryl decided, when the sun had sunken under the horizon and the temperatures dropped significantly.

I pulled my hoodie out of my little backpack and put it on. Thank God I packed it despite the stifling heat that had the communities in a strong grip for weeks now. One thing I had learned the hard way – always pack for the unexpected.

Paul made a quick little fire and we huddled around it. Daryl skinned his snake and speared it on a stick, oblivious to Paul’s grimace of disgust. I sorted through my backpack and handed out our rations; dried apple rings, some tasteless, unsweetened clumps of dough Cora swore were edible and should resemble cookies, and one bag of chips Alexandria had gifted to Hilltop on the last meeting. I was sure Cora smuggled it in my bag, because they were salt and vinegar, my absolute favorite.

We ate quietly and let the fire burn to embers once Daryl declared the snake as cooked. I ate my share without much fuss, but Paul ripped the meat off the little bones in clipped movements, radiating tension practically in waves. Usually, Paul was the epitome of calm, cool and collected; it was one of the reasons people called him Jesus after all. Right now, he was everything but.

We took turns keeping watch and by the first light of the next day, we were on the move again. The trees were thinning and tussocks of brown grass had taken their place. The grass was almost reaching my waist and it whispered in the softly blowing wind. The sky above our heads was massive. Not a good word to describe the sky, but it was the only one that came to my mind. The blue stretched above us from one horizon to the other, endlessly and not interrupted by anything other than clouds. 

The sky above Hilltop was just as empty, sure, because planes no longer flew and left contrails. But there still were buildings, towers and power supply lines cutting into the horizon. Here, there was nothing. Not a single building in sight, no sign of civilization whatsoever, just grass swaying with the winds and juniper bushes dotting the brown ocean under the blue sky.

We still hadn’t reached the top of the hill, probably because the whole land rose slightly. Some miles away I could see a line of hills, softly rising out of the sea of grass. But without the trees we took our chance to stop and have a look around. Up from one of the hills would have been better, but for a first orientation, this was just as good. 

Only, it didn’t help us much. We still had no idea where we were, or how we even got here.

“You think one of us is just dreaming this all up?” I asked Paul.

“What, like _Inception?_ ”

“Yeah?”

Paul huffed out a breath. “I wish. At least then I could hope that Tom Hardy’s coming around the corner, daring me to dream bigger.”

“And call you ‘darling’ in that dashing British accent of his,” I grinned.

“That too.” Paul nudged my shoulder. “Unfortunately, I can remember exactly how I got here. It all started with Daryl’s snake.”

“That sounds downright dirty,” I stated dryly.

I could see Paul freeze for a second, then he leaned onto my shoulder, wiggling his eyebrows at Daryl. “Well, Mr. Dixon, maybe we can set this misunderstanding concerning a certain snake right?”

Daryl glared and grabbed the strap of his crossbow that was once again resting on his back. “Fuck off, prick.”

I gently pushed Paul off my shoulder. “Honestly, boys, any idea where the hell we are? I’ve never been to all areas surrounding Hilltop, but I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

“What, grass?” Paul cocked his head to the side.

“No, nature, Paul. I mean,” I waved my hand before me, “there is nothing. For miles. Shouldn’t we at least see a power line? A windmill? The sun glinting off glass or metal?”

“Ya packed the binoculars?” Daryl asked when Paul didn’t answer me.

“Yeah!” I could have slapped myself over the head. “Small left pocket.”

Daryl rummaged through my backpack and pulled the binoculars out, scanning our surroundings. He wordlessly passed them to me, and I to Paul. He dropped them eventually. We didn’t say a word, because we knew we all had seen the same. Or maybe we all wished the others came up with something and this wouldn’t be so real.

Nothing. We were standing in the middle of a big nothing. Trees, rocks, bushes, the forest behind us and the hills before us.

“I am not an expert,” started Paul after an eternity, “but I don’t think this is a typical landscape of the southern states. Daryl?” It sounded almost pleadingly. As if Daryl could somehow fix this.

Daryl bit his thumb, glaring at the hills and then glancing from under his bangs back at us as if he was afraid or sorry what he was about to say next. “Nah. Never seen anything like it.” He sighed. “The stars’ve changed, too.”

“The stars?” I echoed.

Daryl shrugged his bow higher on his shoulder. He wore the spare flannel Paul had in his backpack, because the temperatures weren’t going any higher than probably sixty degrees. He had shivered his way in his sleeveless shirt through the night until Paul could finally persuade him to change the shirt at least. This wasn’t late summer anymore. It was already fall.

Different landscape, different season and now different stars as well? My head started spinning and the granola bar I had for breakfast sat heavily in my stomach.

“Yeah, constellations aren’t right. Shit, I can’t even tell in which direction we’re goin’. For all we know the fuckin’ sun could rise in the south here.”

I groaned inwardly. Wonderful, it was just getting better and better. Now Daryl couldn’t navigate anymore, not that it would have been much use, since we still didn’t know where we actually were.

“What do you mean by that?” asked Paul slowly.

Daryl bit his thumb again. 

I stared at Paul, who swallowed and stared unblinkingly at Daryl. “We aren’t even in America anymore, are we?” he said.

Wait, what? My eyes nearly fell out of my head as I stared at Paul. Then I turned slowly to Daryl, who was scanning the grassland again. 

“Guess not.”

“What? But – but how?” I blurted out. “We haven’t fallen down somewhere or got hit on the head! I haven’t seen a bright light, so we couldn’t have been abducted by aliens! We didn’t pass anything remarkable! I mean, we took that path on our way to that house!” My blood turned to ice as my mind caught on my own phrase. “Oh God, what if it was the house? Maybe we are still there, dreaming this up. Or we inhaled the spores of some fungus. Toxic spores that give us a trip to La La Land.”

“We are not in that house,” stated Daryl firmly. “Ya stubbed yer elbow on that handrail, ‘member? Can’t get any realer than this pain, I guess.”

Right, I had clumsily elbowed that nice handrail, causing pain vibrating up to my teeth.

“I think, we just got here,” said Paul lamely. His hands hung by his side as he took a slow look around us again. “I don’t know where or how exactly, but I think we just stepped from our … world into this one.”

“Have you checked the radio again?”

It had been the first thing we had tried, but the only answer we got was static.

Paul shook his head. “Still nothing.”

I pushed my hands into the pockets of my hoodie. If this world wasn’t ours, then it could be anything. There could be aliens living here – not the green, little men from Mars, but giant, flesh-eating plants with hidden tentacles or naked, cat-like creatures with three heads that lived from collecting nectar. There could be people living here, who could either be hostile, on the same evolutional stage as Neanderthals or not even existing at all. There could be nothing. Nothing but trees and grass, with us among them, we the three only living creatures under the sun.

I grabbed Paul’s wrist to stay upright. He steadied me with a warm hand.

“And what now?” he asked Daryl.

Daryl pointed with his chin over to the hills. “Up there. Have a real look around.”

Paul nodded. “Alright. Fi? You okay?”

I was not sure how to respond to that. Physically, I felt good, maybe a bit hungry since we lived off our rations that were packed for a maximum three-day-trip, but otherwise totally fine. But I just couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that we somehow left America without setting foot into a plane, let alone somehow teleported into a totally different world, maybe even universe.

A universe where we could be utterly alone with no way getting back.

A chirping brought me out of my thoughts. I looked up to see a small bird flutter from a juniper bush and take off into the sky and suddenly I felt so relieved that at first I couldn’t even place it properly. 

Birds. Normal looking _birds_. This one could have been some finch. Like they lived back home. Maybe this world wasn’t so different at all. Maybe we could find a way back. Maybe it was going to just vanish after a while and we stepped back in our forest with Hilltop only a daytrip away. 

Maybe we just had to be patient.

“Yeah, sure.” I gave Paul a reassuring smile. “Let’s go.”


	2. New Meetings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After stranding in the strange world, Fiona, Daryl and Paul make some discoveries.

Getting to the top of the first hill took us one day and the better half of the next. By now, our provisions had dwindled significantly, and we had to sacrifice a few hours in the morning for Daryl to go hunting. I didn’t expect him to come back with anything that filled our grumbling bellies, but only after two hours he was back with four rabbits.

Dinner that evening was delicious if maybe a bit unseasoned.

The top of the hill proved to be very unhelpful. We were higher off the ground and nothing interrupted our sight, but there was not much to be seen. The grass stretched around us as far as we could see, with little bushes and small trees dotting the swaying ocean. Very far away we could see the blurred shadows of another range of hills. If the directions applied here the same way as in our world, I would say the hills lay northward. 

The scenery changed slightly in every direction – from the forest we had come through to more bushes and small trees in the south. But we couldn’t spot any buildings or roads. The land was wide open and vast. It had the same effect on me as the night sky with its millions of stars. I had to agree with Daryl that the constellations were all unfamiliar, although I only ever was good at spotting the Big Dipper, maybe Cassiopeia and not much more. But the constellations were a constant even during the apocalypse and not seeing them now was unsettling. 

But neither had I ever seen such a beautiful, clear sky before in my life. Of course after electricity died with most of the population during the outbreak, the stars shone clearer above our heads as well. But this, even when the sun was up, just felt different. Untouched, unspoiled and pure. As if nothing ever did darken the air here.

We didn’t have a clear direction, but Paul suggested that if north was the same as in our world, maybe it would be smart to move south and hope for milder temperatures. The nights were not precisely freezing, but we were still used to the brutal heat of August, so we all agreed on the plan.

The days flew by without anything of significance happening. We marched through the tall grass and Daryl’s hunting luck held. He caught rabbits and some fat birds he stated were pheasants, with a regularity that first made Paul and me skeptical. But Daryl just shrugged and said they probably hadn’t been hunted that much by humans before.

It was quiet here. The wind blew softly and the grass whispered its answer with birds calling somewhere from above our heads or from within junipers. But apart from that it was quiet, almost peaceful. I hadn’t even realized how conditioned I already was to expect gnarling walkers around every corner, until they simply didn’t show up anymore.

It was like having a break from the apocalypse. Or being on a holiday. Somewhere far off, to let the wind blow the old cobwebs from your brain and have some time to yourself to do just as it pleases you. I would have preferred a beach Before. Now the quietness and the peaceful setting made my skin crawl with tension, anticipating the big blow. That nothing happened for days didn’t make it better. 

We three were on high alert constantly and it gnawed on us. We always walked in sight of each other, always ready to run or fight. Paul looked grim and was unusually quiet like it had been contagious. Daryl barely slept and was awake instantly if I just breathed too loud. My shoulders and neck were hard with tension, my hand never far from my knife.

Water was a bit of a problem for some time, but then Paul found the little stream jumping down one hill and we followed it, since it flowed in our general direction.

The days passed like this with the same routine: getting up and rekindling the fire, waiting for Daryl to return from his little trip. He usually returned with some game and little news. Once, he saw some sheep in the distance, but no shepherd or dog. Then we walked until the sun was high in the sky and had a little break, usually plastered against a rock to get out of the wind, then we set off again to walk until the sun was lowering itself towards the horizon.

It was during the eighth night that our ears picked up something new. 

A scream.

It chilled the blood in my veins to the core as we instantly sprang up, weapons drawn, and waited with pounding hearts. A cackling echoed over the grass, but we couldn’t locate it. It didn’t repeat itself, but we stayed awake until the sun rose again. 

This day the quietness of the grassy sea bore down on me even more. It almost pulsed in my ears and it drove me nuts that there wasn’t anything. Paul walked close to me, but didn’t say anything to lighten the mood. We only stopped shortly for a quick lunch this time, eager to get moving again.

We had set out again for about half an hour, when Daryl raised his hand to signal us to stop, before he slowly stalked forward, bow raised. Something big lay between the tussocks, unmoving. I drew my knife and wished for the thousandth time that we would have listened to Maggie’s prodding and taken at least one gun with us. But we hadn’t wanted to take a gun and leave Hilltop behind with one firearm short, because you never knew these days. The three of us could work a knife and defend ourselves without a gun and besides, it had only been a daytrip.

Nothing to worry about.

Yeah, see where it took us, I thought sarcastically. 

Daryl was close enough to nudge the thing in the grass with his foot. It didn’t move. Daryl gave it a harder shove and it rolled around. He stared at it, before he glanced back at us, beckoning us over. Daryl scanned the surroundings, crossbow ready and tense.

I stepped up to him and looked down at the thing in the grass. It was a boy, a normal looking, human boy, maybe thirteen years old. An ugly gash ran across his forehead and the blood had soaked his clothes, probably the cause of his death. I knelt down, because even no one wore anything fancy anymore these days, the clothes just seemed odd. 

“Who is this?” I asked bewildered and with a bad feeling in my stomach.

“Don’t know. Not from Hilltop, and not from Alexandria either. Can’t speak for the Kingdom, but I don’t think so. Look at his clothes!” said Paul.

The cloak was made from thick wool. The shirt was rough linen and his pants were too short and worn thin. Everything looked handmade, because the stitches were askew and uneven, the thread count of the shirt too low to be machine-made. The colors were rather dull and the cloak felt itchy between my fingers. There was a small skin that still had some water clipped to his belt, a short and rather blunt little knife, a chunk of something I couldn’t identify, a bit of rope and some dried herbs in his pockets. Nothing more.

I rubbed my nose and glanced up to Paul. “Well, at least now we know that there are humans here.”

Paul’s eyes traveled over the body. “Yeah, but something is killing them.”

“Think he’s infected like us?”

Paul scratched his beard. I couldn’t see Daryl, but he probably took a look around. “If it was him we heard in the night, then he had enough time to reanimate. But he didn’t. I guess biters aren’t a problem here, but we should be sure.”

“Got it.” I knew Paul wanted to spare me this, but I was quicker and already pushed my knife inside his brain. It didn’t do you any good to be prissy, Paul knew that.

“What do we do with him?” I asked softly as I got up again. “We can’t just walk away from him. He’s just a boy.”

Paul sighed. “You’re right, Fi, but the ground is probably too hard to dig deep and we don’t have any shovels.” He looked around, pushing the hilt of his knife in the palm of his other hand. “There is nothing, Fi, for miles and miles, nothing. How did he get here? Where did he come from?”

“You think he is like us? Just stumbled into this world?” I plugged at my bottom lip. 

Paul shrugged. “Could be? I mean, he is the first human we see and he gets killed. What if the only purpose of this world is to get people here and then the natives kill them?”

I shivered at that thought. Wouldn’t be so far off the bat, would it? I knew what kind of sick games people liked to come up with. Seeing others die just for entertainment. 

“Sorry, Fi, I didn’t mean to –“

“Hands up! Now!” Daryl’s voice snapped us both out of the discussion. Paul pressed his back against the nearest rock and I dropped to the ground. The grip around the hilt of my hunting knife was tight.

We could hear someone answering quietly, but Daryl barked again: “Ya move, I’ll shoot ya!”

Paul slinked forward. I couldn’t really move in the high grass without giving myself away with the rustling of the blades of grass.

The voice answered again and this time it was a bit clearer. A man spoke, according to the deep rumble, but the words sounded completely strange. I strained my ears, but the words were foreign.

Oh, dear Lord. 

_He spoke a different language._

Realistically it shouldn’t surprise me. Why should anyone in another world speak or understand English in the first place? Maybe it was a world language, but surely not a universal one. But hearing it? I just realized how deep in the shit we really were.

I stretched my neck to peek over the grass. Nothing. Cautiously I crawled forward, until I lay beside the rock Paul had taken as cover and risked a glance. Daryl had a man at gunpoint, who wore a heavy cloak just like the boy. Seemed to be the fashion around here. He had silvery-grey hair, long enough to fit into a messy ponytail. His face was hidden behind a dark grey beard. That was all I could see from my point. 

He had his hands up as a sign for surrender, which seemed thankfully a universal sign at least. Daryl and Paul stayed a bit uphill, looking down at the man, who talked with his strange language in a placating manner, obviously trying to calm the nerves of everyone.

A dark shadow moved in the corner of my eye, fast and swift, sneaking up on Daryl and Paul’s backs. Something glinted in the sunlight. A knife.

I moved before I could think about it. The shadow was so fixated on my friends that it didn’t notice me. I ran, jumped and smashed into its back with the air rushing out of me with a hiss as we tumbled down. I hooked my leg around a waist, locked the shoulders in a grip Paul had taught me so many times and pushed the point of my knife under the attacker’s chin so fast the other had no time to react.

He struggled against me and the hood slipped off the head. A young man, a few years younger than me, with dark fuzz on his upper lip. He looked clearly shocked that someone got the drop on him and tried to wiggle his way out of my grip, but I only tightened my hold and he groaned in pain as his joints protested.

“You better not move now!” I hissed in his ear.

He stilled.

“Whoa! Easy! We don’t want any trouble!” I couldn’t see Paul, because I was not taking my eyes off the guy in my grip, but I could perfectly picture him right now: his blue-green eyes innocently big, his hands raised and his hair flowing in the wind. I almost snorted. Paul Jesus fucking Rovia.

The man answered in his language. It sounded like nothing I had ever heard before, with a light sing-sang to it and flowing around the vowels. He said a word, then repeated it slower as both Paul and Daryl didn’t react to it.

He said it again, very carefully and I furrowed my brow. It almost sounded like … _friend._ Only with the weirdest accent I had ever heard.

The guy in my grip seemed to sense that my thoughts were somewhere else and tried to break the hold, but I was faster. Paul wasn’t my teacher for nothing. 

The man repeated two words now, the one that sounded like friend and another. It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that he was telling us _his name._

My muscles started to ache and I was not sure how long I could hold my firm grip on the guy, so I yelled a bit strained: “He says his name’s Varin and that he’s a friend! Does he look like a friend?”

There was a moment of silence, before Daryl yelled back: “He has a fuckin’ sword.”

“What, like Michonne?”

“Nah. Bigger.”

Oh joy.

“He’s put it away,” said Paul in his we-are-all-calming-down-now-voice. “He looks a bit miffed because of the stunt you pulled, but I don’t think he will harm us.”

I heard Daryl snort and Paul sheathing his knife. There was another beat of silence and then steps came closer. Paul and the man entered my vision, with Daryl a step behind and his loaded crossbow still trained to the man’s head.

Up close, the stranger looked like someone in their late fifties, with an old scar splitting his lip, and kind, brown eyes. His dark eyebrows that hinted at his former hair color, rose up his forehead as he laid eyes on me.

He stared down at me, a bit shocked, then a smile played around his lips as he said something softly to me. I didn’t understand him, but his tone and body language were clear enough. Slowly, I pulled my knife back and released the guy out of my grip. Daryl’s crossbow still pointed at the back of the man’s – Varin’s head.

The younger man hastily pushed himself away from me, stumbling a bit as he straightened, and took a step to the side, only to look straight at Daryl’s bow.

Varin didn’t pay him much mind, or so it seemed, as he offered me his hand with a smile. After a short glance at Paul, I took it to be hauled to my feet with surprising strength. 

Varin bowed – he _bowed_ – and said his name again. He gestured to the other man, who didn’t look as intimidating as I thought without his hood and standing awkwardly before me. He kept his head down, staring at his boots, so Varin gave him a soft nudge. He glanced quickly up, got red and muttered something that sounded like “Vandil”.

Varin said more to me, gesturing between them. I didn’t have a clue, until he said a word that might be ‘sun’ in this strange accent. 

Sun. Oh, _son._ Father and son!

I smiled and nodded. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Paul looking a bit lost between us, and Daryl still aiming at the backs of these men. “My name is Fiona. Fiona,” I repeated, deciding to reduce the words to a minimum to avoid misunderstandings. 

“Paul and Daryl.” I pointed to them. Paul gave a small wave and Daryl stared darkly. 

“Can you put that down, Daryl, please? I don’t think they’re gonna attack us,” I said, barely keeping from rolling my eyes.

“Somethin’ killed this boy there. We’ven’t met anyone for days and now these two? Close to the body? Nah, keepin’ it up.”

As if understanding him and with a quick glance at Daryl, Varin slowly went over to kneel beside the corpse of the boy. He said something as he checked it just as we did before and his face darkened as he touched the gash lightly. I didn’t catch any more words that registered somehow as he talked with his son. 

Standing beside Paul I warily watched them examine the body. Varin and Vandil both seemed pretty experienced and I was not sure what that told me. That they both had seen their fair share of dead for sure. But they weren’t so detached that they weren’t affected, so probably that meant they weren’t bad people.

Their clothes looked hand-made like the boy’s, but from a slightly better quality, although they were dirty and travel-stained. The boots fascinated me, because they too were hand-made and worn, but looked sturdy enough to be actually useful. But what was most fascinating about them both were the swords clipped to their belts. They looked real, well-used and intimidating.

I couldn’t help but looking Vandil over again. He looked like a younger version of his father, with dark brown hair and the same brown eyes, but his face was still unscarred and the skin around his eyes smooth. He still didn’t look up at us and his movements were a bit skittish.

“I think you shocked him a bit,” whispered Paul in my ear. “Should have seen his face as he realized you were a woman. You are probably the first one to touch him like that.” His grin was shit-eatingly wide.

Before I could hiss back at him that he should shut up, Varin’s voice traveled over to us. He held the boy’s head in his hands, pointing down at my stab through his ear as Vandil bowed his head over the wound.

“Oh, that was me,” I threw in.

Varin looked up with furrowed brows. _Why?_

“We didn’t know if he would get up again and– argh, dammit!” I rubbed at my forehead. 

Well, so far them and us recognized the same gestures and expressions in each other, so maybe a bit of pantomime could help. Dramatically, I pressed my hand down on my heart, let my tongue fall out of my mouth and my eyes roll into the back of my head. After a moment I made a snarling sound in the back of my throat, blinking my eyes open again, and attacked Paul, trying to bite into his neck. Paul was thankfully smart enough to get the hint quickly and mimed the knife-to-the-brain-part dutifully. I went limp again, staying a bit longer that way so the meaning could get over.

I glanced through some strands of my sun-bleached hair at Varin and Vandil. Both looked at me with huge eyes. Not in understanding but utter confusion.

Great.

“Well, at least that rules out biters as a part of this world, I guess,” stated Paul dryly. “Your act was pretty neat.”

“Yeah and they also think I’m complete bonkers.”

“But it was a great performance.”

“Yer such a prick, Paul,” muttered Daryl. He slid down the grass to stay at my other side, the crossbow lowered, but still loaded.

Varin and Vandil changed a look I couldn’t interpret, then they got up from the ground. Varin talked again in this strange accent of his, speaking very slow and repeating words, but we stared back at him blankly. 

He got noticeably more frustrated with each helpless shrug from our side, so he finally pointed back at the corpse and stated very firmly: “Orc.”

Paul froze beside me. I suppressed the sudden urge to push my fingers in my ears and twirl them, because I couldn’t have heard right. Orc? As in _The Lord of the Rings_ -Orcs?

I dared to glance at Paul. He looked a bit white under his beard and the dirt smudges across his cheek. Daryl gripped his crossbow harder and pressed it back up against his shoulder, not aiming, but ready to.

“Orc?” I repeated, because Paul didn’t do anything, not even breathing as it seemed, the bastard.

Varin nodded solemnly. “Orc.”

I sucked some air into my lungs through my teeth. That cackling we heard last night was an … orc? Or maybe this was a huge misunderstanding and _orc_ didn’t mean orc, but … I didn’t know, _dead,_ maybe.

Ripping the band aid off wasn’t usually my tactic, but at the moment I didn’t care. I would risk the jump into unknown waters. 

I pointed to the corpse again and asked: “Mordor?”

Varin gave me a sharp look, but shook his head. “Gundabad,” he said with a one-sided shrug of his shoulder. He wasn’t certain.

I wanted to groan. Varin knew Mordor, and how high could the chances be for another language to use both the words _orc_ and _Mordor_ and meaning something totally different? Besides, _Gundabad_ did ring a bell in the _Lord-of-the-Rings_ -section in my brain as well.

“Are we ...?” started Paul flatly.

“I think so,” I answered. My voice shook lightly.

“This is Middle Earth?”

“I guess?”

“The fuck yer talkin’ about?” hissed Daryl.

“What are you Tolkien about,” said Paul in the same monotone voice, staring blindly off into space.

I ignored them both and fixated Varin with my eyes. I pointed at the ground in front of me and asked with a voice that sounded a bit too high to my own ears: “Arda?”

Varin nodded.

Paul made a strange whimpering sound at my side.


End file.
